Twitter is not dead yet…

Let’s discuss these issues that Twitter actually needs to address (and not timeline algorithms):

Char limit [expanding past 140 characters]

The current limit dates back to Twitter’s early days, when they wanted Tweets to be able to fit into the 160-character limit of SMS messages (i.e. cell texts).

I understand the need for brevity in tweets. And I agree. “Get in and get out” of every tweet, not brew a pot of tea and snuggle into your blanket to get prepared for reading one post.

But can we at least increase the limit from 140 to perhaps 160 or 200? I’m not calling for #Twitter10K here. Not at all. A small increase would not fundamentally change the feel of Twitter. And it probably wouldn’t be that noticeable on timelines.

Or maybe you can exclude @handles and #hashtags from counting towards the character limit. That would help so much! Potential abuse should be noted.

Editable (tweets)

Raise your hand if you had to delete a tweet right after you posted it because you made one of these blunders: 
 — forgot to put the “.” (full stop) in the beginning so that everyone could see it
 — forgot to properly mention the correct @handle or #hashtag
 — accidentally misspelled something

After a tweet is posted, there could be 2 boundaries for editing it:
- time bound (e.g. cannot be edited after 1 minute)
- character bound (e.g. cannot add/edit more than 10 characters)

Filter out (tweets)

There are a couple reasons for this suggestion.

I don’t want to see 30 consecutive tweets from 1 person. It just forces me to mute them. And I am not going to remember to unmute* them some time later.

I don’t want to see a person(s) discussing some topic I am far from interested in (e.g. #TwilightMovie). I will likely mute them as well.

This is how Twitter can solve it:
- filter out tweets based on specific keywords/#hashtags
- group a person’s tweets regarding one topic together (like a tweetstorm) so that it won’t flood your timeline, in the same way that it groups tweets if the person replies to their own tweet (“view conversation” link)
* a time-bound mute function could unmute a person so that their tweets aren’t lost forever [thanks @vmcampos for the input]

Images (full size when clicked)

It doesn’t occur all the time or on all platforms, but when a tweeted image is clicked, it pops up as a smaller-scaled version. The images that are affected like this exceed a particular height (e.g. greater than 500 pixels).

The picture below demonstrates my point. On the left, the image as it appears on my timeline (Twitter crops it to a certain height for the timeline). On the right, the clicked image is scaled smaller. Where is my magnifying glass when I need it?

While we’re at it, can images get the hyperlink contained in the tweet by default?

Color-grouping (by user-set criteria)

We often choose to follow people based on aligned interests or what they are primarily focused on tweeting about (local/national news, musical events, etc).

Twitter could give us the ability to color-code specific people based on whatever criteria we choose. The colors should be subtle & pale and not stick out like a sore thumb, otherwise your eyes would become biased towards certain colors that pop out.

Advertise (for Twitter)

Can you recall the last time you saw an ad somewhere FOR Twitter? Hmm… Though I can recall the last time I saw an ad FOR Facebook… it was through their sponsorship of a presidential debate.

Either Twitter hasn’t been advertising itself, or none of its advertisements were memorable, at least to me.

Perhaps Twitter needs to step up its advertising game plan. We could begin to see much more people coming to Twitter and actually staying.

I was the user that Twitter should’ve advertised to, should’ve engaged. I made my Twitter in 2009 [@pjohnston] for the sole of reason of getting a good user name in case I ever truly started using it (I didn’t want @pjohnston2973200 when the time came). My Twitter sat primarily dormant for so long, until the beginning of 2016.

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One thing about the new timeline algorithm — it’s not going to affect you, it’s going to affect everyone else. I say this because you will carry on as normal, not aware of what you are missing. But to everyone else, their tweets will get buried under the “best tweets”. It’s all about location, location, location right? Effectively, you may now have only HALF the followers you had before.

Isn’t it a bit counterintuitive that Twitter says the new timeline algorithm will help new users? New users will realize that their tweets are not going to be seen by the established users, because their tweets are far from being labeled as one of the “best”. That may actually turn off new users from using Twitter because why tweet if you have no listeners?

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Instead of using #RIPTwitter to complain (I am guilty), why don’t we use #FIXTwitter so suggest things that we actually want?

Twitter just has to open its eyes and read what its users are saying. They don’t even have to pay a research firm to do it. Bam!

What do you think? What would you suggest?